Kapow

Wayne Rooney probably having to sit-out the World Cup finals this summer because of injury recalls the loss of a key player from England's squad 20 years ago because he was kidnapped.

Roy Race was in Bobby Robson's squad for the 1986 World Cup finals in Mexico but decided to go on a club trip to the Middle East. There was a political coup while they were there and the whole party was imprisoned.

None of which actually happened, of course. Roy Race was a piece of fiction, but his creator turned him into the most famous British fictional sportsman. For decades he was a firm favourite with readers of first Tiger comic and then with a magazine of his own.

Every week from 1954 till well into the '90s his amazing exploits gripped the attention of a huge following of young readers.

He last played for England in 1991 (as player-manager of the B' team) when he must have been in his mid-fifties (at least).

A loyal player for, and later manager of, Melchester Rovers, he won nearly every honour.

Roy of the Rovers scored incredible goals from impossible situations, snatched victory from the jaws of defeat innumerable times and captured the imagination of all sports-mad youngsters.

All his feats were presented in comic-strip form, but there were earlier equally famous fictional sports heroes from comics such as Adventure, Hotspur, Rover and Wizard.

Two of the most popular were Alf Tupper (Tough of the Track in the Rover from 1949 and later as a strip in Victor comic in the early '60s) and Wilson of the Wizard.

Alf was a working-class, hard-as-mails runner whose stories ran for nearly 40 years. He got all his energy from eating his favourite meal, fish and chips out of newspaper wrapping.

He slept on a mattress on the floor of a welder's workshop and he was always the underdog who came out best in all his scraps on and off the track. He often fell asleep on the bus journey to the running track (usually London's old White City) and he missed his stop. After sprinting to the stadium he would get there in the nick of time for his race, which he always won, including breaking the world mile record.

Wilson was only ever known by that one-word name and his adventures featured in the Wizard comic from 1922-63. He was supposed to have been born in 1795 and gained a rugged physique from a rough life in the Pennines, where a hermit told him the secret of a long life.He ran in a black woollen body-suit and once ran a mile across country in three minutes.

He served in the RAF in World War II and then trained athletes for the 1948 Olympics in London. He conquered Everest alone in 1951 (two years before the mountain was first climed in real life by Sir Edmund Hilary and Sherpa Tensing).

A unique football star whose astounding deeds grabbed my attention in the early 1950's was Limpalong Leslie, another Wizard character. Inside-left Leslie Thomas's left leg was shorter than his right because of a childhood accident. Captain of Darbury Rangers, one of his greatest feats was scoring a sensational hat-trick to win an FA Cup-tie against Marchester City (yes, Marchester, not Manchester).

His other passion was competing in sheepdog trials with his dog Pal and on one occasion he turned down the chance to play for England against Scotland because the date clashed with an international dog trial.

Lastly I give you Bernard (Bouncing) Briggs, one-time all-round sports star of the Wizard, Hotspur and then Hornet.

He rode a motor-bike with a bathtub sidecar and excelled at boxing, football, ice hockey, rugby league, tennis and wrestling. And all that before breakfast. No, just kidding. I made up that bit, just like the authors of all the aforementioned fantasy figures.

If you have your own special childhood fictional sports hero, do let us know. Write to Sports Editor, The Press, 76-86 Walmgate, York YO1 9YN, or email sport@ycp.co.uk